VAR

Thoughts on VAR after last night?

On talk sport early today they read out the handball rules and not in any way did that decision against Croatia match up to the rules. It has to be deliberate the hand or arm moving towards the ball and not the ball moving towards the hand or arm TL is once again the lad to ask but to me personally it has been the penalty decisions that VAR has consistently got wrong.[/quote]

I’d agree that it’s been the handball decisions that VAR (or the ref’s have after watching it) has got badly wrong – although I also feel that it seems bizarre at the times it does get used as opposed to some blatant things where it doesn’t get used

For me that yesterday was never a handball offence in the memory of man – handball is the only offence in football that mentions intent. You have to deliberately handle the ball & there is no way on earth that the Croatian player deliberately handled it.
You can infer intent based on the position & or movement of the arms but that yesterday was a case of him moving his arm in a natural movement following his jump & the ball hitting his arm as it was moving downwards.
He didn’t jump up with his arms above his head & that it was headed on to them (when for me you can infer intent as there’s no need for the arms to be in that position) & you can even see him trying to move his arms out of the way in the fraction of a second after the ball goes over the French players head.
Just because he deliberately moved his arms doesn’t mean that he deliberately handled the ball
But that’s the problem with VAR for handballs & also why nowhere else in the laws of the game does it mention intent – because its impossible to get inside a player’s head & determine that they meant it. But you start to watch it over & over again with slow mo & freeze frames & it starts to put an intent there that doesn’t exist
With a claim for a foul & penalty you can see its either a foul or it isn’t – if the law on foul tackles said it had to be deliberate you’d have a nightmare judging that.

I also think the ref interpreted the use of VAR wrongly – if it has to be a clear & obvious error & you spend several minutes looking at it, make up your mind & then go back to have another look then it isn’t clear & obvious

We’ll never know if this is the case but the ref then made a decision which for me altered the outcome of that match. It was 1-1 with Croatia far & away the better side & all of a sudden just before half time you’re 2-1 down with a mountain to climb. It effected the mental state of both teams & the 2nd half reflected that. Awful decision

That said, by & large the VAR worked a bit better than I thought it would, although it needs a lot more work on it – namely when it is & isn’t used coz there were some horrible inconsistencies & yeah, it really didn’t seem to work for handball appeals

The thing is though the final decision is still made by the referee, he just watches a replay which makes it even more baffling when he comes up with a decision like Sunday.